For starters, my little family was in tears. This movie will tug at the very depth of your emotions. It is a true story about very different people, the struggles that bring them together, the challenges that life can offer and the story of one incredible woman that brings it full circle. It has many beautiful and also heart wrenching moments. Even though there are some sad themes, you will finish watching with a full heart.
I am not going to give you too much of the storyline because I do not want to ruin it for you, but it was worth the emotional ride.
LEARN FROM CHALLENGE: Sometimes you learn how strong you are through the struggles you go through. Deb wanted to find a way to connect on a deeper level with her husband, so she took him to a soup kitchen. Oh, the lessons they learned together.
HAVE A HEART OF GOODNESS: Deborah had a way of looking beyond the exterior and finding the heart of goodness in anyone. She brought out the good in people. She gave them a chance. She had a dream about a man…I had another dream. It was about a poor wise man who changes the city. …Can’t you just see it?! Flower boxes… A place where people know they matter just as much as people on the other side of that tunnel?!
IF we could all take that into our own life, the world would be a better place. If we could even just start with a smile to a stranger or think outside of ourselves for one day–that would be a good start. Maybe you could make cookies for a neighbor, hand out water bottles to homeless people on a corner, leave a nice comment for a cashier who checked you out at the grocery store. Begin small. One tiny act begins and then swells into more.
BE TRUE TO THOSE AROUND YOU: I fell in love with the love and respect these two men shared. They were strangers, grew closer together through challenge & found a lasting friendship. Before I answer your question about being friends, something I wanna ask you. Something about white people always bother me. When white people go fishing, they do catch and release… See where I growed up… when we finally caught something on the line, we’s real proud of what we got. [We sure didn’t release it.] … If you is a white man that is fishing for a friend and you just wanna catch and release, then I got no desire to be your friend. -Denver
When you give a plate of food or $1 to a homeless man, what do you think you’re doing? Helping?! No. A plate of food don’t change nothing. You’re tell him you seehim. He’s not invisible. -Denver
WE ALL HAVE SOMETHING GOOD INSIDE US. No matter what, Bless him. Your daddy got a good man inside of him. Sometimes you just gotta bless the hell out of people. Your daddy had a lot of hell in him. -Denver
This is a genuine lesson on remembering that no matter what people go through, what addictions they pick up along the journey, what stories they tell themselves or those they love…no matter what has happened, we have to remember that there truly is a good person in there somewhere. They have just forgotten, have become numb, have lost that part of themselves & need to rebuild to find it.
WE ARE ALL THE SAME KIND OF DIFFERENT: She was different. She saw me behind them bars and reached down and pulled me out with the key God gave her.
I used to spend a lot of time worrying I was different from other people. Even homeless people. … But what I found out, we’re all different. Same kind of different as me.
Miss Debbie, she a whole nother kind of different. Miss Debbie dreamed of a better place for us homeless folks. And I’m not talking about heaven. I’m talking about right here.
Whether we’s rich or whether we’s poor, we’s all homeless, every last one of us. Just working our way back home. -Denver
I LOVE this last thought. WE are ALL HOMELESS, just working our way back home. If you think about that, there is so much truth in that statement. We are all just working our way back, learning life lessons, learning about our human selves, trying to work together, finding and appreciating the spiritual sides of our existence, etc. We are all in a state of progression, trying to find our way on the path of life, on the journey back to our spiritual home.
EVERYTHING HOLDS A TREASURE, A GIFT TO SOMEONE: God’s in the recycling business, of turning trash into treasure. -Ron
I think life holds so many moments to find the hidden gems of lessons that need to be learned. Sometimes we become jaded to the homeless guy on the corner or begin to not care about the needs of others, sadly. Life is a path & the books we choose to read, the movies we watch, the conversations we have, the stories we hear about, the people we come across along the way…all become a part of our bigger story. We take little nuggets of wisdom, lessons learned, feelings felt & we thread them into the story of our own life.
I can vividly remember moments with complete strangers, conversations with homeless people, stories shared with me by cashiers I just met…I believe everything comes into our life or happens for a reason. It may simply be the need for connection, but what we take from it– that becomes our life treasures, the little gems that stay with us for our own journey.
I believe this movie was a genuine gift to my little family. It touched every single one of us on various levels. My daughter never cries during movies and rarely cries about anything, but was genuinely touched and became so emotional. It was a beautiful gift to see her emotion. My husband seemed to have a new outlook on possibly trying to find some avenue to help people in some way. I felt so much gratitude to be a family. It was a lovely gift to all of us.
I guarantee you will probably cry, maybe feel some sadness, will experience lows and highs, but you will also be moved by the beautiful message behind the true story.
Enjoy. Peace, love and kindness to you today. -H
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